Wal-Mart exploits unpaid teen labor in Mexico

Around 19,000 teenagers, mostly grocery baggers, are working for free at Wal-Mart’s 62 Superama markets in Mexico.

The stores encourage customers to tip their “volunteers”—a designation used to circumvent minimum wage requirements.

“In economic terms, Wal-Mart does have the capability to pay the minimum wage, and this represents an injustice,” said Federal District Labor Secretary Benito Mirón Lince.

Wal-Mart’s Mexican subsidiary is making more money than ever before, yet it insists that grocery baggers are not workers and are not entitled to the minimum wage of less than $5 a day. In a system that demands ever-greater corporate profits, there is no such thing as too much exploitation.